


What Happens Next

by Austell



Category: The Property of Hate, Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-26
Updated: 2015-10-26
Packaged: 2018-04-28 08:16:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5085166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Austell/pseuds/Austell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The poor man just couldn't stand by and let it happen. It's his weakness. This is a prose mock-up of how his boss fight might begin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Happens Next

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this Tumblr post](http://modmad.tumblr.com/post/131942532950/but-what-about-negative-rgb-being-an-encounter-in). I decided to try my hand at, well, this. And now I'm posting the resulting ficlet here, because I have no self-restraint. Enjoy!
> 
>  **important addition** —My knowledge of Chara and Frisk has deepened considerably since I wrote this little fic, and I would like to warn that it contains a portrayal of them that I would now consider (to put it gently) to be absolutely and totally wrong! I'm looking at rewriting it or just removing it, but in the meantime please look at works in the future of this one for something with fewer evil children??? I am sorry!

**First attempt.**

The child stood over the mound of reddish mud and dust in the corridor, panting, drenched in sweat. Their veins coursed with adrenaline, and their heart pounded with horror, and it all swirled together into an energising euphoria. They tasted blood in their mouth—it was all so familiar.

Their legs shook as they crouched, but they didn’t feel the least bit tired. They ran their fingers through the remains and mouthed, “ _You’re dead._ ”

Then they struck at it with hooked fingers, scattering a spray of the stuff across the room. They’d done it! They really had. They grinned, and heaved themself up onto their feet, and kept walking, the knife clutched tight in their hand.

The shadows of the old pillars passed across their eyes at rhythmic intervals, silently interrupting the golden light that filtered in through the windows. Their footsteps went _clap, clap_ rhythmically on the floor, somewhat more quickly. The echo of their footsteps went _click, click_ , at just the same speed. They saw the door at the end. Maybe there’d be some one there.

 _Click, click_ went the echo. The child stopped. _Click, click_ went the footsteps.

 _Drip, drip_ went the water on the tiles.

The child turned around, and there was the man with the television for a face. His clothes were oddly grainy, with strange colours flickering across them, and there was a curious slouch to his posture. In his right hand was his cane, and in his left hand was a round metal canteen. _Drip, drip_ went the water from the side of his head.

“W-well,” he said, “hello—hello, there?”

The child marched quickly towards him, and he stumbled back. “Steady now, steady! Don’t point that thing my way—it’s really none of my business what you do here.”

The child—they— _Chara_ opened their mouth and spoke. “You’re not going to fight me?”

“Well, I did-didn’t-didn’t _come_ here to fight you,” said the man, flickering. A bit of red dribbled onto his shirt, blurred, and changed to green. 

“Then stand there and die.” Chara kept walking.

“Now, then, that’s—” the man cut himself off with a sigh. He was backing away, down the corridor, but not too quickly. “What did I do to deserve this? Haven’t I got prop-prop-problems enough?“ He tripped over his own feet and _flickered_ and was standing. “That’s a good question in general, isn’t it? I step off a cloud and I end up in a hole underground. I get out of the snowstorm just to end up battling rain. I want some one who wants to _save_ a world, and instead I get you! God, what a mistake!”

Chara broke into a run.

The man threw his cane in a panic, and missed, and then he bolted back down the hallway. “Look,” he called from a distance—he was already out of breath, it sounded—”it’s plain to see you wo’n’t listen to reason, but at least you might consider taking a break? It’d be a great deal easier on my conscience, at least, not to see another world destroyed while I’m still in it!”

“Coward,” said Chara.

This seemed to touch a nerve. The colours on the man’s face bent. “Fine,” he said. “Well and fine!” He drew his legs together and stood tall. “But I say,” he added on hurriedly, “it’s thoroughly confus _ing_ —”

 _Snap_ went his fingers. Something caught Chara in the back of the neck, and then they were sprawled against the wall, flooded with pain and the definite taste of blood in their mouth. They pushed themself up, and slowly their eyes focused on the man. They glared at him.

He opened the canteen with a sharp twist. His cane was hanging from his arm, and there was a bit of blood on it. “Never mind,” he said cheerfully. “Let’s get to business, shall we?”

He raised the canteen with trembling fingers to his face, as if to take a drink. “Good God,” Chara heard him mutter under his breath, “after this, I can _really_ say I’ve done it all.”

He poured the entire contents of the canteen over his head, screaming, and then collapsed prone on the ground.

Chara got to their feet at last, faintly bemused, and looked around for the knife. Ah, of course. They were still clutching it in their hand.

The man flickered, in and out of vision.

Chara approached him unsteadily.

He reached up with one hand.

Chara pushed it aside and brought the knife down, right into his heart. Then the hand was around their throat.

The man rose into a crouch and forced them onto the ground, strangling them. His face was black and white static, a single baleful eye.

They kicked at him and pushed on his arm and pulled on his fingers. They tried to reach the knife, to pull it out again. _Clap, clap_ went their shoes against the floor as they kicked and struggled.

The man did not turn to dust. He squeezed, and squeezed, and squeezed, and was silent.

And eventually Chara was silent, too.

* * *

**Second attempt.**

“W-well,” said the man, his head colourful and dripping, “hello—?”

“You’re not a monster,” snarled Chara. “What are you?”

“Not a—I’m not a human, if that’s what you’re asking,” said the man. “Now, I’m here to—”

Chara lunged. The man swung his cane in a panic and caught them on the side of the head.

“—with you,” the man was saying when they recovered consciousness, “is that you don’t listen, none of you ever listen! I’m waffling, yes, but bear with me—”

Chara got up, slowly.

“—oh, and there we go! Little demon. I’d carry you home kicking and screaming if I had the stomach for it, d’you-d’you know that?” He spread his hand helplessly, flickering. “But I saw what you did to the other one. I’m not touching you with a ten-foot pole.”

Chara said, “So you leave it to your other self. Coward.”

“I beg your—? Oh, of course. It’s that”—the man waved his fingers—“ _thing_ you have.” He flickered. “It’s that— _thing_ you have.” He flickered. “—you have.”

Chara said, “You’re stalling. _Coward_.” And they rushed towards him.

The man was just unscrewing the canteen, and dropped it in his panic. It hit the ground and splashed water everywhere. He staggered back, fizzling, and fell to his knees, flickering, and rose slowly, hissing with white noise.

Chara swiped at his knees as he got up, but the cane came lightning-quick, batting their arm away with a sharp crack.

They ignored the pain and grabbed at the knife with their other hand, steadying it as they swung again. The knife severed the hand holding the cane, and it fell straight off.

 _Snap_ went the fingers of the man’s other hand. The cane struck Chara in the neck and there was a flash of something like pain, and then darkness.

* * *

**Third attempt.**

The colours on the man’s face bent. “Fine,” he said. “Well and fine!” He drew his legs together and stood tall. “But I say,” he added hurriedly, “it’s thoroughly confus _ing_ —”

And _snap_ went his fingers. Chara ducked, and it went sailing over their head, and they kept running.

The man flickered.

The cane hooked around Chara’s ankle, tripping them and pulling them along the ground to the man’s feet.

“I said,” said the man, planting his shoe gingerly on their arm, “that I didn’t want to fight you. How about—” he flickered, and changed colours—” _you try stabbing me in the heart again, you disgusting wretch?_ Oh, why do I even bother?”

Chara loaded.

* * *

**Fourth attempt.**

The man poured the entire contents of the canteen over his head, screaming, and then collapsed prone on the ground.

Chara heaved themself to their feet and trotted unsteadily towards him. Not the heart, this time—he had none there, that was clear. They angled the knife and drove it straight through his glass screen with a satisfying—

— _flicker_ —

They were on the ground, the man was covered in water and screaming—

—he was standing some metres away, looking around, his clothes were black and when he turned his face was a single eye—

—”it’s thoroughly confusing, I say,” he was saying, “because, well, didn’t you want to be a _hero_?”—

—a hand reaching for Chara’s face—

Chara loaded.

* * *

**Fifth attempt.**

The child turned around, ready, and there was the man with a television for a face. In his right hand was his cane, and he stood tall.

“Well,” he said, “well—well—wellwellwell _hello_.”

He flickered, and his face was a single eye. The air hummed with static.

Chara mustered their determination and lunged.


End file.
